The pot started on the absurd side, with some commentary by the boisterous Neil Flamer and some pushback from the table.

“You’re arguing with yourself,” one player drily mentioned.

Soon the matter at hand became more serious, however.

Bryan Neira and Jason Hickey put in action on every street of the pot, concluding with a 46,000 bet by Neira on the {Ad}{8h}{9c}{10d}{8s}.

Hickey, who has had a very active Open, examined the final bet and Neira carefully. He is a stoic, stern player for the most part but after thirty seconds he suddenly jerked upwards, and then clenched and released a fist.

He examined his stack. The call would cost almost a third of his chips.

On a flop of {Jh}{9h}{8d} Daniel Gordon (bb) fired a bet of 26,600 into the pot. Wazir Baksh (button) jammed for 94,300 total. It only took a couple of moments for Daniel to call with {ah}{jc} despite the dripping wet board. His top pair/top kicker turned out to be good against Wazir’s {kd}{9c} (middle pair).

The turn was the {7h} and changed nothing. The {jd} on the river was just salt in the wound. Wazir hit the rail shortly before the blinds went up. Daniel chipped up to about 320,000.

Flight A players are off for their final break of the night. When they return, they’ll play three more levels, then begin the bag & tag process.

Sean Barringer (Saugerties, NY)

Shortly before the break, Sean Barringer opened for 5,500 from the hijack, then Michael Drabot 3-bet to 13,000 from the cutoff. The player on the button 4-bet shoved. Sean tossed his cards to the dealer and after getting the count, Michael followed suit. The player on the button showed AK as he collected the pot.

Sean was happy to see that, saying he folded AJ. He’s still sitting comfortably behind about 150,000 chips.

In an unusual situation that spilled from level 12 to level 13, Ken Weinstein on table two apparently tabled his hand prematurely, and yet having turned it back over, both doubt about the price he was offered and even the hand itself began to creep into Kevin Grabel’s mind.

It must have been frustrating for Grabel as winning the pot would double his stack. On the flop of an approximately 120,000 pot, ten high with only a few straightening possibilities, Weinstein had put in his last 22,500.

Yet the exposed hand was – or might have been – {Tx}{Tx}!

What could Grabel have? Clearly crushed but getting six to one, he pondered.

Was the gamble correct?

His opponent didn’t make it easy on him, however. Weinstein chattered throughout the decison.

“You’re going to fold,” he said derisively, and called the clock.

Frustrated, Grabel called his opponent a mild name. Game on.

“Sixty, fifty-nine, fifty-eight…” Weinstein counted an imaginary clock as the floor had yet to arrive.

Eventually, Grabel folded and the bickering continued.

Afterwards, Weinstein, clouding the issue to tease Gravel, mentioned his hand was eights, and another said nines. Grabel had to double check his own memory of the event.

Weinstein is up to 220,000 and Grabel is around the average with 115,000.

Jon Borenstein entered and took his seat just as registration was closing for this flight. Given his results, he’s got the skills to work with a 30 big blind stack. He’s already up to ~120,000 (50 big blinds) after just a couple of levels.

His career earnings are just under $690,000 with his best live cash of $118,937 coming in the Colossus II event at the 2016 World Series of Poker. Just a few weeks before that he made the final table of the Borgata Spring Poker Open Championship, earning $80,122 for 5th place. Paul Volpe, the eventual winner of that Championship. cracked Jon’s pocket Queens with AK to end his run.